A look at the impact of Covid in interest for Climbing, Cycling and a few more outdoor sports from 2020 when the pandemic began to the end of lockdowns. Have we seen a lasting legacy??
Online search trends are a good approximator of overall subject interest. Covid had a huge impact on the world and a huge impact on both our working and recreational lives. This basic analysis looks into how web search interest has changed based upon Google Trends data.
Google Trends data gives an indexed search volume score. i.e. a relative score from 1-100. What this means is that whilst we are not seeing an absolute number of searches we are able to make good comparisons of change over time and between sports. I am looking at UK data first and foremost however one interesting followup could be to contrast with other nations.
Overall change over time
Summary: As Covid and lockdown kicked in there was a huge rise in web search interest around the kinds of sports and exercises people could practice from their front door without need to use a facility or travel. Whilst for some sports this has settled back since, i.e. search volumes having returned to pre pandemic interest levels, there are a few lasting impacts.
The below summary data shows the change in indexed volume of search. Comparative interest columns show overall interest multiplier versus fishing (as a benchmark). See below the table for further information on how to understand the metric. I have used 2019 as YoY comparator as the last “normal” pre covid year.
| Sport | Comparative Interest ’19 | Q2 ’20 v. Q1 ’20 | Q3/Q4 ’20 v. Q1 ’20 | 2021 v. 2019 | 2022 v. 2019 | Comparative interest ’22 |
| Climbing | 0.5 | +11% | -9% | -9% | -2% | 0.5 |
| Cycling | 0.7 | +100% | +41% | -1% | -9% | 0.7 |
| Fishing | 1 | +90% | +58% | +9% | -3% | 1 |
| Running | 1.8 | +33% | 0% | 0% | +8% | 2 |
| Sailing | 0.2 | +7% | +59% | -1% | +6% | 0.25 |
| Walking | 1.5 | +4% | +15% | +21% | +13% | 1.7 |
- Comparative interest relates to the sport popularity. 0.5 shows that there was 0.5 times the web search interest in climbing versus fishing for Q1 2020.
- Percentage columns show the web search interest change for the comparative period. e.g. 2021 v. 2019 -1% for cycling shows an decrease of 1% in web search interest for Cycling for the whole years compared.
A few basic insights
- Some sports saw a huge spike in web search demand once covid kicked in. But not all. Noticably those which require equipment, travel and usually multiple people to participate, e.g. sailing and climbing saw little impact.
- The biggest spikes were cycling (100%) and fishing(90%). Both sports which don’t require extensive travel and can be done alone, an opportunity for furloughed workers. The fishing spike was delayed, likely driven by the one hour exercise limitation.
- Running also saw a significant uptick (33%) in immediate interest although this progressively dropped off in 2021. 8% growth (’22 vs. ’19) in running interest hopefully indicates some lasting legacy.
- The overall declines in post pandemic interest versus pre is most notable for cycling (-9%), which is indexing below 2019 interest levels for 2022 YTD.
What next?
There are loads of interesting ways a deeper analysis could go. Please leave a comment if any of these would be of interest:
- International dimension. Does this mirror impacts seen under different lockdown regimes?
- Sporting sub class impacts. Cycling has strongly defined interest groups, road versus mountain biking versus cycle touring.
- Search type analysis. Video versus conventional search versus shopping. This can all add nuance.
Data Challenges
Some data caveats to consider. I have done this basic analysis as a bit of fun and out of personal interest but as ever there are some things to consider:
- Search terms don’t always fully indicate searcher intent. Becausing someone searches on running does not always mean they are specifically looking to participate. They may have an armchair interest, or their interest has remained the same but their shopping behaviours have shifted to online, increasing the scope of what they search for online versus shopping in person.
- Seasonality always plays a part. As Covid lockdowns kicked in early spring this is normally when we would expect to see some increased interest in outdoor sports. However if we look at the trends here we can see the “covid effect” on certain sports far outweighed the normal seasonality.
- Organic growth in web search interest. UK data works quite well for this purpose as we are to some extent at a point of market saturation of web search usage. i.e. pretty much everyone is online, using search and therefore this is unlikely to have had major impact on the insights.
- Search sophistication changes over time as people become more sophisticated. i.e. people who search for “cycling” are more likely to use more complex and nuanced search terms around the sport as their knowledge grows.